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Detroit Promise Path

Project

Overview

Project Overview

College Promise is the latest college access movement in the United States. With more than 200 programs across the nation — a number that grows every year — College Promise is driving national conversations about college access and affordability. These programs typically cover college tuition and fees for students in a particular geographic area to attend college. Some programs help students at a particular high school, while others are broader, serving all students in a city or state. Many of these programs reach out to families well before students are considering college to show them that college is a viable option for everyone.

The Detroit Promise, administered by the Detroit Regional Chamber, has operated since 2013 under its former name, the Detroit Scholarship Fund. The Detroit Promise offers Detroit’s recent high school graduates a last-dollar scholarship – meaning all tuition and fees are covered after financial aid is applied – to any of five area community colleges. The scholarship covers three years of tuition. While the program has substantially reduced financial barriers to attend community college for the city’s high school graduates, Detroit Promise students’ persistence rates once they arrive in community college remain distressingly low.

To improve students’ college experience and help more students persist and graduate, the Chamber partnered with MDRC to create the Detroit Promise Path, which adds proven-effective student support services onto the existing scholarship. The services include a comprehensive coaching component with a dedicated campus coach and monthly financial supports to offset other costs of attendance, such as transportation. The program, operated centrally out of the Chamber, relies on data tracking through a Management Information System to ensure it is operating effectively, to monitor students’ progress, and to communicate with students.

MDRC is evaluating the Detroit Promise Path using a randomized controlled trial design. The first cohort of students enrolled in fall 2016, and early findings from the evaluation show that the program is helping these students stay enrolled and enroll full-time. A second cohort will enroll in fall 2017.

The Detroit Promise allows the city’s high school graduates to attend local colleges tuition-free. To that existing scholarship the Detroit Promise Path adds campus coaches, monthly financial support, enhanced summer engagement, and messages informed by behavioral science. Early findings from the first year are positive.

College Promise programs help students access college by covering the cost of tuition and fees, but they do not typically address barriers to student success. In this episode, Alyssa Ratledge and Monica Rodriguez discuss the Detroit Promise Path, which provides evidence-based support strategies to students to help them stay in school and graduate.

Detroit Promise provides last-dollar scholarships to Detroit high school students who enroll full time in one of Detroit’s five area community colleges. Like other promise scholarships, Detroit Promise covers students’ remaining tuition and fees after federal financial aid is applied. In the new program, Detroit Promise Path, all students continue to receive scholarships for the full three-year period. However, they are also eligible to receive new services and benefits, described below, to address other barriers to college success:

Required coaching. A Detroit Promise Path campus coach assists a small caseload of students with academic and personal support topics and undertakes an intrusive advising model, in which they actively reach out to students through multiple modes of contact. The coaches use a Management Information System (MIS) to collect data about students’ participation and monitor students’ academic progress.

Monthly incentives. Enrolled students who meet the program requirements receive a monthly financial incentive of $50 to offset expenses, such as bus passes, not covered by financial aid.

Data tracking and program management. The program is managed by the Detroit Promise Coordinator, who oversees the coaches and monitors students’ participation and outcomes through regular data reports out of the MIS. These data reports provide a mechanism for continuous program improvement through central oversight.

Summer engagement. The program staff encourage students to participate in productive summer activities, including enrolling in summer courses or pursuing summer employment through a local jobs program.

The Detroit Promise allows the city’s high school graduates to attend local colleges tuition-free. To that existing scholarship the Detroit Promise Path adds campus coaches, monthly financial support, enhanced summer engagement, and messages informed by behavioral science. Early findings from the first year are positive.

College Promise programs help students access college by covering the cost of tuition and fees, but they do not typically address barriers to student success. In this episode, Alyssa Ratledge and Monica Rodriguez discuss the Detroit Promise Path, which provides evidence-based support strategies to students to help them stay in school and graduate.

Detroit Promise Path students can enroll at any of Detroit’s five area community colleges:

Henry Ford College

Macomb Community College

Oakland Community College

Schoolcraft College

Wayne County Community College

To be eligible for Detroit Promise, a student must have graduated from a Detroit high school and must have attended a Detroit school for at least 2 years. All 2016-17 Detroit Promise community college students who were new to college were included in the Detroit Promise Path evaluation, for a total of 624 students. (Note that these are students who indicated they planned to attend community college and completed the Detroit Promise application form. Not all students enrolled in school.)

The study uses a random assignment design to estimate the causal effects of the Detroit Promise Path. Eligible students are randomly assigned either to a program group, which receives the scholarship plus the Detroit Promise Path services, or to a control group, which receives the scholarship and the schools’ usual services. (All students continue to receive scholarship dollars regardless of treatment group.) Data sources include transcript and administrative data and interviews with program staff and students.

The Detroit Promise allows the city’s high school graduates to attend local colleges tuition-free. To that existing scholarship the Detroit Promise Path adds campus coaches, monthly financial support, enhanced summer engagement, and messages informed by behavioral science. Early findings from the first year are positive.

College Promise programs help students access college by covering the cost of tuition and fees, but they do not typically address barriers to student success. In this episode, Alyssa Ratledge and Monica Rodriguez discuss the Detroit Promise Path, which provides evidence-based support strategies to students to help them stay in school and graduate.

Ratledge joined MDRC in 2012. As a research analyst in MDRC’s Postsecondary Education policy area, she works closely with community colleges, technical colleges, and open- and broad-access institutions to implement and evaluate programs.

COMPLETELISTOFPUBLICATIONS

A student success program for Detroit Promise scholarship recipients combines coaching, a monthly incentive, summer outreach to keep students engaged, and a management information system used to communicate with students and track their progress. This Issue Focus provides more detail about the program model and shares early implementation lessons.

The Detroit Promise allows the city’s high school graduates to attend local colleges tuition-free. To that existing scholarship the Detroit Promise Path adds campus coaches, monthly financial support, enhanced summer engagement, and messages informed by behavioral science. Early findings from the first year are positive.